


Opus No. 1

by sapienti0sat



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: F/M, FBAWTFT, Post-Canon, Pre-FBTCOG news
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-07
Updated: 2018-10-07
Packaged: 2019-07-27 10:41:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16217363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapienti0sat/pseuds/sapienti0sat
Summary: When Tina met the English wizard, she could never have imagined the consequences of that day.When Newt first entered New York, he had never expected to be thrust into one of the most dangerous wars in Wizarding history.When Jacob realised the world was not as it seemed to be, he went where no-Maj has been before.When Queenie chose love over law, her decision would change life as she knew it.After their adventures in New York, Paris seemed a world away from the havoc of that Christmas. But now they're on a mission, one that no one could foresee. The clock is ticking, the catacombs are calling.There will be war.





	1. Affrettando

**Author's Note:**

> Previously known in my tumblr as 'Again and Again'  
> I started this mini series a long time ago before postgraduate education took over my life. Note, I did write this before the news of Leta and Theseus being a thing so this may be considered canon-divergent.  
> Either way, I hope you all enjoy! My thesis is due on the 18th October and final presentation on the 4th November.  
> After that I will be able to update this more frequently.  
> For now please feel free to leave your thoughts down below and thank you for clicking on this story!

Tina never thought that the first time she met the mysterious Leta Lestrange in a battle. All those months not hearing from Newt, sitting in her MACUSA office and running her beat in New York, thinking of any and everything she didn’t know about the woman that was in the picture. None of those images, scenarios, personality traits came to mind amidst the dust and rubble, the blazing flashes of wands firing spell after spell. In that instant, looking at Leta, she could only think of one word.

_Terrified._

The girl was absolutely terrified. In some part of her mind Leta was likely older than her, but those suggestive eyes from the photograph were wide with fear, her coffee coloured skin paled and stretched taught against cheekbone features. Leta was like a child. No matter her family name or the fact that Tina knew nothing about her, the flicker of jealousy, anxiety or even anger at meeting the girl who was always in Newt’s mind disappeared.

Tina almost hacked at the dust was became stuck in her lungs when she breathed in humid air. She ignored the searing discomfort in her chest as she hurried towards Leta Lestrange whose back was pressed against the stone wall.

“Miss Lestrange,” was all she could manage before she forced Leta down on her knees, Tina half covering the woman’s body as another spell hit the ceiling further above them. Leta was shaking almost uncontrollably, her head scarf loosening to hint at midnight curls. Tina looked up to see Newt running from the end of the tunnel, his batter boots hitting the floor in the rhythm of his unique gait.

Another blast of magic and Tina forced her eyes closed as more rubble fell. Blindly, she flung a defensive spell back behind her. A curse in a foreign language bit back at her but Tina didn’t feel relief. She grabbed Leta’s shoulder non-too-gently and pulled her into a crouched position.

“Run to Newt!” Tina hissed with semi urgency as she flung another spell into the dark corridor. She pulled her into a run but the other woman hesitated almost in shock.

“Newt? What… Newt…he?” Leta barely stuttered, her eyes darting between Tina’s to the tunnel but started when a gust of wind whipped beside them both. Newt Apparated beside Tina, hair dishevelled, vibrant blue coat covered with grime and dust.

“Tina, we have to—” His words faltered to as complete halt when his green eyes landed on the woman she was covering. And what Tina saw in those eyes that she’d missed more and more each day in America nearly crippled her resolve. Such confusion, pain and… _wonder_. Newt’s mouth moved to say Leta’s name but no sound came out. Leta was in the same amount of shock, just staring.

The hair on the back of Tina’s neck rose infinitesimally as the air crackled with another attack. Thrusting her wand forward in defence, her shoulder jarred at the force against her conjured shield. The footsteps were faster in speed now and instinct told her that their attacker was going to Apparate.

“Newt!” Tina ordered, snapping his attention from Leta’s face back to her. His arm had instinctually and protectively gone around Leta’s shoulders, his body angled to shield her from the attack. Tina never knew a heart could wrench right near her throat. “Go! Take her!”

Mind straining, Tina put her Auror training to the absolute test. Maintaining concentration and wand-work accuracy regardless of emotionally compromised. Instinct. Wand-work. Protect. Attack.

_10 seconds and he’ll be there._

“GO!” Tina roared one more time when she forced herself to take prominent defensive position in front of them. “Help Queenie get the door open and GO!”

She could palpably feel Newt struggle behind her, divided against loyalties yet so emotionally battered by the petite woman beside him.

_One final push Tina. Come on._

“Protect my sister Newt. Protect _her_.”

By the time her wand was shooting another spell, the air behind Tina was empty. Hollow.

Electricity charged the air once more, rippling along her skin horrifyingly. Tina stilled her fear, stilled her beating heart as the cloaked man appeared no less than two feet in front of her. Not Grindelwald but one of his followers. Even in the lack of light she could see the glint of his teeth as he sneered.

Tina fired spells again and again and again. Her rhythm never stopped as she was forced to take footsteps back behind her from the sheer force of the spells. For a moment, she almost expected the Swooping Evil to spread its skeletal wings in front of her vision, giving her a respite from the pounding that was beginning to beat in her temples. Then the rest of her heart clenched.

There was no one there behind her. No other wand that can be raised to help her. No Englishman with his suitcase full of weird and wonderful beasts. He was with Queenie, battling the locks to the exit that will guarantee their escape. He was with her. The enigmatic Leta Lestrange.

She was a second too slow as she turned, the spell cutting a sharp red line against her pale cheek. Tina shot back at him again, mustering all the strength she had.

They needed time. Tina will give them all the time they needed. No matter how much she wanted to see a blue coat in her periphery. No matter if she knew he was doing the right thing.

_Are you alone, Tina?_

This time she couldn’t block the spell and it hit her side, flinging her entire body against the stone wall. The man growled when a wall of light blocking his path. She spat out the blood pooling in her mouth.

_Always alone, Mrs Esposito._


	2. Battuto

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Battuto - To strike things with the bow
> 
> Give them time. Just give them time.

Queenie heard the turmoil in his mind before he Apparated beside her. She didn’t have to look at the woman beside him to know it wasn’t her sister. One would’ve thought that the distance between Tina and Queenie would dampen their clarity of Tina’s thoughts. But growing up Queenie always knew her role in the duet that was their life. Where other saw polar opposites, one the bread winner, the other just sunny, between them both it was not the truth. Whilst Tina had put it onto herself to stand up for their small family unit, Queenie was always checking on her older sister. Little tastes here and there, nothing that would forcefully violate her privacy. Her Legilimency was just that, an art of innate subtlety and constant shielding from thoughts. But not even Midas himself could stop Newt’s thoughts from clashing in the cacophony of feelings and sounds in her head. Nor could the distance stop Tina’s sadness, pain, and lethargy from echoing the worry in Queenie’s own heart.

Under normal circumstances Queenie would’ve greeted them both with a bright smile all the while sorting through the information running into her invisible ears. Under normal circumstances, introductions would’ve been made and she would tell herself not to make up conclusions. This was not normal circumstances. Her spells seemed to hit the last of the locks ineffectively, washing over it like harmless water but she kept trying.

“Know any fancy spells to _help_ , Newt?” Queenie asked in a neutral tone.

When people struggled with their thoughts, it was like rewinding a badly formed record. They screeched and halted, fine cracks through veils of consciousness until a definitive response could be formed. This rewind would be completed in a matter of seconds. Newt’s was taking a bit longer.

“Newt?” She prompted as she flung another spell.

Not saying a word, he examined the lock with a sharp glance. His wand flicked out and whatever spell he threw dissolved into the lock in silvery threads. Newt tried again with series of other spells, his gaze focusing on anything but Leta Lestrange.

_Cistem aperio._ White light burst forth with ferocity but the lock still remained.

_Portaberto_. Only the rocks beside the door splintered onto their faces and Queenie flinched.

“This is the last one, surely we can Apparate out.” Queenie couldn’t help but whisper to herself. Her heart whirled as she sensed Tina’s thoughts spiralled from forced calm to resoluteness and the echoing of one phrase.

_Give them time. Just give them time._

Newt’s eyes swung back towards the end of the tunnel the dimmest flashing of light indicating the ongoing battle behind them. Tina was holding him back, but just. They were moving backwards.

“We can’t be sure. We don’t want to risk getting splinched.”

Queenie felt her panic rising even as she told herself to think like Tina. “There must be something.”

Newt began to hover his wand at the rock around the frame. His movements weren’t frantic but purposeful. A weakness, he was looking for a weakness in the foundations.

“The spell has to find a foundation. If we find the weak point we can possible weaken its strength.”

Queenie kept trying, conjuring up any spell she could think of to get an escape. A cry of pain in her mind made her flinch but she couldn’t think of Tina right now. It took Queenie a moment to realise that Leta hadn’t spoken a word. As Newt and her kept scouring the area, she had moved closer to the lock. One slender hand reached out in a second and grabbed it.

“Leta!” Newt exclaimed in shock when Leta simply gripped the lock more firmer despite the pain etched in her face. Subconsciously, Queenie could see the workings in her mind, the intricacies and the growing horror.

“The curses on this lock isn’t going to break with any of those spells, Newt.” something in Leta’s eyes didn’t sit right in Queenie’s chest. It was too devoid of any particular feeling even as her hand began to blister. “We need something more aggressive. Destroy the lock itself. We need to use a curse.”

Suddenly more footsteps towards them and Queenie heard Tina’s scream both in her mind and her ears. “RUN!”

Blinding green flashes hit the walls now and Queenie was truly terrified. There was no denying it now. Newt ran forward a few steps then stopped as if in instinct. His head turned back towards Leta and his voice was deadly calm.

“Leta… Leta, don’t.”

Leta held her wand aloft, pointed in the direction of the tunnel. Newt was slowly moving to the centre of her vision, hands slightly raised. Perhaps he did this with his wild creatures, Queenie thought in one non-terrified part of her mind.

“They aren’t going to this time –”

“Leta, this isn’t the past. Don’t—” Newt strode forward but she only raised her wand higher. Queenie pointed her wand at the other woman and the aggressive stance was so ill-fitting she wanted to put it down immediately.

Tina wasn’t saying the spells silently now. Only exhaustion and increasing stress would cause her to break from her silent ingrained incantations. They were getting louder.

“We need a way out.” Suddenly Leta’s wand wasn’t raised at the corridor but to the ceiling.

“NO!” Queenie shouted. She lunged at Leta’s hand but it was too late. The spell already flew from her once quiet lips.

“REDUCTO!”


	3. Con forza

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> con forza - with force
> 
> If the legendary Theseus Scamander was worried, something was indeed amiss.

Jacob crouched low to the ground when the very ground vibrated with supernatural intensity. The rifle in his hand felt cooler and sinister, the memories of his time in the in the war machine that was the Great War caused his fingers to fall into the proper position. Braced and aimed once more. Despite the many days rolling dough and creating baked delights, his hands were steady against the metal beast. And it was just that, a beast. But unlike Newt’s magical creatures, this beast answered to anyone who placed their index finger to the trigger and had the mind to prepare themselves before the recoil hit. Dust fell lightly from the empty building’s desecrated roof, so light that it was a mist that covered the very light shining through the lonely window panes. Jacob didn’t take his eyes away from in front of him. Though he couldn’t see it due to some magical illusion (he still wasn’t quite sure what it was precisely), the other wizards around him were just as focused. No one more so than Theseus Scamander himself. Theseus stood with his back against the other wall beside the window pane, his feet slightly apart against the rumbling but nothing more. Keen eyes steady and piercing into the same view as Jacob’s, the other man didn’t move. His wand hand appeared relaxed, but the buzzing energy was radiating from the man in waves.

“Come on,” Theseus murmured under his breath. “Come on.”

The words were the same as the ones Newt would use when coaxing his creatures. He would use a gentle tone, stance non-threatening, a sort of light in his eyes that reflected off the multitudes of freckles on his face. Yet the light coming from those same coloured eyes did not belong to the man that Jacob called a friend. Jacob never saw the resemblance between the two Scamanders at first. In many ways, they appeared vastly different even in their similarities. Their colouring seemed to be the very end of that familial connection. One commanded the attention of hundreds, sure footed, steady gazed. The other hid from attention and like the creatures he protected, rarely showed the very heart that made him a man of great integrity. But the two brothers shared an understanding of what was around them, without vanity or pretense. Both men were exactly who they were and they understood themselves. But regardless of his calm face and neutral stance, it was that moment that Jacob saw the brother beneath the veneer of the war hero and Auror. For if the legendary Theseus Scamander was worried, something was indeed amiss.

“What is taking them so long?” An Auror questioned further into the room. The other man gave Jacob yet another disbelieving look before quietly pacing towards Theseus.

“Your little brother should never have been—”

“Newton is here for a reason, Belclare.” Theseus gave the other man but a passing glance before returning his eyes towards the courtyard. Jacob wondered what he saw there, for all he could see was barren land with a rickety shed that was absurdly placed in the centre of an abandoned apartment complexes.

“This is not one of his expeditions in the wilds of Merlin knows where.” Belclare was cut off when yet another tremor rocked through the earth. Jacob had a nauseating feeling that perhaps the very foundations would fall from his feet.

It was a tribute to Theseus’s temperament that he did not say word against his fellow Auror. His tone was all that was needed. “As long as we are co-operating with the French, the plan remains the same. We wait for Newt’s signal. Are we clear?”

An instant later the other man Disapparated into thin air. Theseus gave Jacob a wry look with his eyes.

“What do you say to a man like that, Mr. Kowlaski?”

Jacob decided that perhaps making mundane comments in particularly dire situations was not something specific to the English but to the Scamanders themselves. Only this time they were not in front of a jewellery store, but a middle of a warzone. But he didn’t have time to answer.

A crack as loud as a thousand trees breaking echoed, gong-like in this tenor. Then the ground started to crumble. Jacob shifted his stance once more, hoisted his rifle higher and aimed. Even with his growing dismay, multitude upon multitudes of cracks broke in rapid succession.

“Not quite what we planned, little brother.”

Theseus’s arm wrapped around Jacob’s shoulder’s even as the world started to spin. One moment the building was shattering under his feet, the next Jacob was leaning against the wall just metres away from the massive hole. Both he and Theseus leaned more against the wall as the very foundations they were standing on before crashed downwards onto itself.

Jacob managed to see three figures Apparating to the very edge of the cavernous hole before disappearing a heartbeat later. He thought he saw blonde curls, but he wasn’t sure. But soon enough black mists arose from the whole in rapid succession, swirling into corporeal form and chaos reigned. Cocking his rifle by movements purely mechanical, he fired.

Theseus sprang into actions, his wand at the ready and soon the Aurors from the gathering surrounds pebbled the fields with open fire. Blazing wide shots sprang from wooden tips and thunderous strikes hit their mark and the walls around them. Jacob kept ducking then firing then ducking, again and again.

In the distance he saw Theseus turn his head almost instinctively towards his younger brother before he ducked, a dangerous spell missing his hair by inches, only kept safe by his innate reflexes honed from experience, pain and training. Jacob was too busy feeling the sinking feeling of sadness as one of his bullets hit a dark wizard. The man toppled forward, hands clawing at the earth. Jacob didn’t like killing, one should never enjoy such a thing. In this, he and Newt were one in the same. No matter the Great War, Jacob was not a killer.

Theseus kept firing, hitting his marks but never stopping. “NEWT!”

Jacob couldn’t see the magizoologist, had no indication of a blue coat but suddenly a warm hand was on his shoulder and a whiff of spring perfume. He barely had time to brace himself before he was stumbling a foot away, hitting gently into soft arms and a heart shaped face. If seeing her face didn’t hit him in the gut every damn time.

Queenie quick blink indicated that she had heard his thoughts, but no quirky smile tugged at her normally happy lips. Instead, those blue eyes focused on the figure beside Newt. Jacob froze mid word and blinked. His eyes weren’t deceiving him, it wasn’t one of those glamours that seemed so common in their wizarding world.

A second later, the wind stirred and Theseus stepped forward. “Did you get the artefact?”

Those blue eyes focused on the other woman and it slowly blinked too. “You.”

Newt reached into his coat pocket, passing the ever precious metallic piece of ancient magic into his brothers hand. His expressive brows where pinched, his eyes flashing between the woman that Jacob didn’t know and the fight ahead of them.

“Where’s Miss Goldstein?” Newt’s older brother voiced whilst giving Queenie and the other woman an acknowledging nod. Newt looked at his older brother with a face that Jacob had only seen once before, a long night in New York when havoc befell the starry city in the form of an orphaned boy. Theseus didn’t miss a beat.

“The plan still holds. Jacob, Queenie… Miss Lestrange and yourself, get to the eastern Quarter.”

Newt shook his head with a firm hand around his wand. His body was turned away from them, eyes constantly scanning the terrain. Queenie held onto Jacob tighter and Jacob could not ask a word. The woman stared at Newt with a dispassionate gaze though not unkind. It was a kind of gaze that said she understood and yet was separate from all that was happening. Jacob was sure there was blood dripping from her fingers.

“Newt,” Theseus’s voice was unyielding. “Miss Goldstein will be fine.”

“It was Kojanovic.”

“Impossible.” Jacob heard the note of disbelief in Theseus’s voice. Queenie stiffened imperceptibly but the other woman simply looked away as if… guilty. Newt sensed it too as his gaze focused on her.

“Kojanovic was the one that got you here, wasn’t he, Leta? After all these years—”

Jacob jumped in his skin when Queenie Disapparated them out of the area and into a nearby shelter. The others soon followed once their original position was hit with multitude of spells.

“Newton, listen to me. I vouched for you as long as you get the artefact. The more we stand here, the less protection I can offer you by the Ministry or the French.” Theseus grabbed the younger man’s shoulder and gave it a shake. “We have to leave.”

“I’m not leaving here in a middle of a battle,”

“You have never been in battle—” Theseus all but spat.

“You have no idea!” Newt shouted back, practically vibrating with contained agitation. “You have no idea and I haven’t been there to tell you but this is not the place. I am not leaving her.”

“Newton—” Theseus gripped him once more but suddenly the dirtied peacock blue coat and ruffled hair was gone, vibrant strings of reality slipping between the war hero’s fingers. The older man cursed long and hard, his hand threading through his hair.

Queenie gasped in horror and her face swivelled left and right in pure growing terror.

“Where’s Tina, Queenie what’s happening?” Jacob finally asked as he tried to get her attention.

“ _And so does the lark cry his name_ ,” whispered Miss Lestrange, looking at the place Newt once stood. Theseus’s eyes were tense on the surroundings, no doubt looking for the blue coat. “ _But winter comes and snow it rains. With somber sounds of golden orbs_ —”

“ _does Death come knocking on your door._ ” Queenie spoke hollowly. Jacob couldn’t breathe. Miss Lestrange eyed Queenie somewhat curiously.

“A Legilimens. What a shame. Do you enjoy what you see?”

“Do you, Leta Lestrange, enjoy what you have seen?” There was no malice in Queenie’s voice, but a tremulous revelation. Leta Lestrange said not a word. Just a small sad smile tipped one corner of her mouth. And an explosion so violent that building around them fell shook the earth followed by a scream.

 

 


End file.
